Margaretta D'Arcy statement from Global Women's Strike

Free Margaretta D’Arcy, Free Shannon
Statement to the Press and the Public

We are outraged to learn that our dear sister and colleague Margaretta D’Arcy has been jailed – again! – for two weeks for protesting the use of the civilian airport at Shannon for US wars. And we are furious that the state ignores the possible effects on her health and well-being as a cancer patient .  This is how they think of those of us who are elderly or ill or have disabilities or are female and insist on protesting injustices, the greatest of which is war.

To underline her case against Irish complicity in war, Ms D’Arcy has also now taken the principled step of abstaining from food in solidarity with prisoners everywhere and all of those who have lost their lives, homes and communities destroyed as a result of US military action, and the actions of their political and military partners, beginning with Israel and its slow genocide of Palestinians. One of the many public services Ms D’Arcy has performed is to protest the Irish government’s many years of complicity in US war crimes and its destruction of Irish neutrality, the precious legacy of our great struggles, where Ireland leads the world. She has been dedicated to highlighting that the most devastating impact of war is on women and our children, both directly from the bombs that rain down on us, and by paying with our poverty and overwork for the horrendous weapons of massive destruction that threaten us all.

Ms D’Arcy is a veteran of Greenham Common Women’s Peace Camp, which opposed the US military placing cruise missiles on common land in England, and won – the camp is no longer a military base. To dissent from a perspective of permanent war and austerity, and demand the protection of life and the planet, is increasingly labelled subversive and even criminal behaviour. While war criminals are allowed to pass through Irish airports and financial criminals go unpunished, the Irish State in thrall to the US, UK, EU and IMF Masters of War has imprisoned a pensioner who has dedicated herself to highlighting and preventing war crimes.

An attack on courageous and principled Margaretta D’Arcy is an attack on us all.
We demand the immediate release of Margaretta D’Arcy and free Shannon airport from the US military!  We want our neutrality back!

Invest in Caring Not Killing.

Please see www.shannonwatch.org and their facebook page for further details: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Shannonwatch/268685181500